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we’ve caught the composting bug

July 9th, 2009 by nebhead

I’m not sure if it was that we were inspired by Anne or some of our other friends who compost regularly but we’ve finally given in.  Suzy sort of talked me into it, but anything involving worms and decomposing organic matter and I’m hooked.  Actually, it took a steady campaign by Suzy to even get me to allow the purchase of the materials.  But it all finally came together this week.   We’ve had the plastic bin for several weeks now, which I promptly drilled many small holes into with my cordless drill.   It was wildly fun to poke holes in a perfectly good plastic bin.  I relished it with childlike abandon.  But after the the drilling was done, I lost interest for a couple of weeks.

Suzy had started using one of the small buckets that some of my beer making supplies come in for storing up food waste.  It was rapidly filled and eventually exceeded capacity.  This was the breaking point, we needed to get this project underway.  And so, as you’ll see in the photos below, we made good on our plans to get this thing going.  Read the captions to see just exactly what the heck we’re doing.

I really hope it works out.  I have no idea how to tell if it’s working.  I’m sure the little worms have retreated into the bedding, and will not be seen again for a long time to come.  I just hope they’re OK in there.  In this hot California heat, they may have been cooked in their little plastic oven.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 9th, 2009 at 8:53 pm and is filed under home. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.

9 Responses to “we’ve caught the composting bug”

  1. Gravatar Anne Says:
    July 9th, 2009 at 9:56 pm

    Yay! Worms are super fun. Kinda creepy, but fun. You can tell if it is working when you see them having worm orgies and producing tons of offspring. There should be eggs everywhere pretty soon if conditions are right. I sometimes get scared by how many worms I have, but I guess you can always share the wealth with a neighbor. I have to harvest the poo this weekend. Totally not looking forward to it, yet kinda fascinated at the same time.

  2. Gravatar Ingrid Says:
    July 10th, 2009 at 3:10 pm

    This is awesome! I don’t have a worm bin like that, but a more traditional composter. It too is full of wormy goodness, but probably not as fun to look at as your bin will be. Mine has yucky bugs in it too.

  3. Gravatar Kristi Says:
    July 13th, 2009 at 11:52 am

    Question: Why is Suzy doing all the icky work and you’re standing back taking all the pictures? You afraid of the worms or the slimy banana peels?

  4. Gravatar nebhead Says:
    July 13th, 2009 at 1:15 pm

    Ah, good question. It’s actually because Suzy is a much more attractive model than I am. Plus she was so excited to get this project going, she barely gave me enough time to grab the camera and take pictures. I think I even had to tell her to wait, so that I could document each step.

  5. Gravatar Anne Parmeter Says:
    July 13th, 2009 at 4:33 pm

    Is that what the child birth will be like too? “Suzy, hold on! I need to put new batteries in this camera!”

  6. Gravatar Laura Says:
    July 15th, 2009 at 12:05 pm

    Ha! Good one Anne! I am sure that Ben would aquire some new and not so nice nicknames too.

  7. Gravatar ben Says:
    July 15th, 2009 at 12:11 pm

    Nice one. I love a good burn. :P

    “Yup, just hold that pose… yes, I can see the raw pain and anger in this shot. Hold it just one moment more. Oh, wait, I’m out of memory, let me change memory cards… “

  8. Gravatar joyce Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 8:39 am

    Indoor composting (where do you store your container?) fascinates me. Doug and I manage to keep two bins going but we have them set up about a block from the house. I like having them out of the way because I enjoy the trek and I can also stockpile other ingredients like grass clippings, yard debris, and stove ash to add as needed.

    I’m afraid that my worms might not be as cute as all of yours. Could it possibly be the country worm versus city worm story? I’ll have to observe Anne’s worms carefully . . . maybe bring some home for a cross cultural experience.

  9. Gravatar ben Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 6:11 pm

    We’ve got our bin outside, next to the house. I’m afraid that those little worms are going to cook in this heat, but perhaps when things start to decompose a bit more we can dig around and see if there are any left. I may have to get more from the bait shop. Apparently, you can’t just get any worms from your garden, you’ll want to pick up red-worms for composting. I picked up red trout worms which are supposed to be superb for worm composting.